From Bad to Worse
by irite
Summary: Bruce Banner doesn't think his day could get any worse...until it does. Takes place during Iron Man 3. Oneshot.


**Massive thanks to my beta, dysprositos, for beta awesomeness and helping me work out the title.**

**Warning: IM3 SPOILERS.**

* * *

It was dark when Bruce Banner asked that a grateful mother cut his hair in return for him bringing her son's fever down. If she followed the usual pattern, she would have offered him dinner or some other method of payment within her means, but he'd already been fed once that evening and now needed something different.

He was speaking her language carefully, slowly, but she seemed to understand and fetched a pair of scissors, gesturing for him to take a seat in a chair.

Setting his glasses on his leg, he did. It was relatively quick, just a few snips, and then the too-long curls were falling to the floor as she brushed his shoulders off.

She patted his shoulder and told him she was done. He didn't ask for a mirror, and she didn't offer him one.

Quickly making sure that she knew when to give her son the pills he was leaving and how many, Bruce slid his glasses back onto his face and efficiently finished packing up his bag.

After looking in on the sleeping boy one last time, Bruce slipped out of the house and into the night.

His plan was to change clothes and ditch his glasses and bag, hopping a plane and heading for yet another destination, hoping to lose the SHIELD tail that he just _knew_ he had.

So he swung by a small corner grocery to use their bathroom and ditch his old things in the garbage; he had another bag, a new pair of glasses, and a change of clothing with him.

He'd no sooner walked through the door before the kid behind the counter was hurrying around to him, talking fast.

Bruce managed to deduce that the kid thought his hair was horrendous, and a look in the bathroom mirror revealed that his hair looked like someone had attacked him with a lawnmower.

Sheepish, Bruce went back out, and the kid brandished a set of clippers at him. Bruce didn't ask where they'd come from, just took a seat where the kid was pointing and closed his eyes.

When he went back into the bathroom, he found that his hair was now passable, if very short.

Changing his clothes quickly, he stuffed the bundle into the trash can and exited the small room.

On his way out, he handed the kid the last bit of currency he had, which seemed both a good way to dispose of it and a way to thank him for rescuing the tragedy that was Bruce's hair.

At the airport, he already had his ticket and was able to board the plane with little trouble; nobody looked twice at him.

One of the perks about having your more well-known identity be large, bright green, and generally unidentifiable as you, he supposed.

But it was when he was exiting the plane that the trouble began. A tall, dark-suited, sunglasses-wearing man casually walked over and took his arm.

"Say anythin' and I shoot," he said, a hand hovering above his hip.

With no other option but to cooperate, at least at the moment (the airport was small but crowded and Bruce _couldn't_ have an incident there), he went.

The man escorted him to another terminal, and marched him up the steps to a private plane, unmarked.

By this time, Bruce was beginning to become quite annoyed, and he was going to give someone a piece of his mind about this treatment.

His escort shoved him into a seat and told him, "Buckle up."

Putting his bag on the floor between his feet, Bruce did so, glaring mulishly.

The man ignored him in favor of buckling his own seat belt and speaking into his cell phone, "I have secured the cargo."

Oh, _great_, Bruce was reduced to 'cargo,' now.

The plane began to move under him, taxiing to the runway, presumably.

Bruce's bodyguard looked at him and deliberately shut his own cell phone off. When Bruce continued to stare back, his arms crossed over his chest, the escort demanded, "You got any electronics?" Bruce shook his head silently. "Okay, then."

They passed the plane ride in silence until Bruce unbuckled and stood up. The goon (Bruce was irritated enough to reduce this guy to 'goon' status), hastily undid his seatbelt and lurched to his feet, drawing his gun.

"You aren't actually going to use that in here, not unless you have a death wish," Bruce stated calmly. "Now, does this thing have a bathroom?"

The henchman shoved his gun back in its holster and took Bruce's elbow, yanking him to the back of the plane. He opened the bathroom door for Bruce, who inclined his head in mocking gratitude. He shut the door in the man's face and threw the lock, slumping against the sink.

As he regained his seat, he decided it might be worth fishing for information. This guy obviously wasn't SHIELD; the last time Bruce had been on a plane with them, he'd been shown their tranquilizers before they'd even gotten off the ground.

So who was this guy?

The rest of the ride passed in silence, and as they landed, Bruce picked up his bag and stuck out his elbow for his escort to grab. He promptly did, and Bruce suppressed the urge to roll his eyes.

They walked down the stairs and off the plane; Bruce was immediately shepherded towards a waiting car. The airport, well, what he could see of it anyway, looked nicer, more upscale, than what he was accustomed to.

His guess was Europe, and he knew for certain now that he wasn't dealing with SHIELD.

Which left a limited number of possibilities. And really, only one that made any sense.

The door of the car was opened for him by yet another dark suit-wearing man, and Bruce slid inside.

As he suspected, Tony Stark lunged forward to take Bruce's hand, wrapping his free arm around Bruce's shoulder, exclaiming, "Banner! Long time no see! You look different, lemme guess, haircut?"

But Bruce ignored the jab, his irritation, because he had noticed something when Tony's chest pressed against his, and he pushed Tony back into his seat to stare at the center of his sternum.

"What the hell, Stark?" Bruce said upon confirming that yes, there was no arc reactor there.

"Oh, that little thing? Got the shrapnel taken out, I'm a new man. It's a long story, come on," Tony took Bruce's bag off his shoulder and tossed it onto the seat next to him, rapping on the divider between them and the driver.

The car started to move, and Bruce grumbled something unintelligible under his breath, fastening his seatbelt.

Ignoring him and reaching over into the minifridge, Tony offered, "Want something to drink?"

"No." Bruce was still annoyed about being kidnapped, and he informed Tony, "Your charming employee threatened to shoot me. Twice. Once was on the plane, while we were _in the air_."

Tony made a face. "Oops. Yeah, I didn't tell him who you were, just told him you were a flight risk."

"And you needed to speak to me so desperately why?"

"Not here, Banner, this isn't the proper setting for this kind of conversation. So, what have you been up to? Getting your hair cut, I see."

Bruce did not resist the urge to roll his eyes, and instead answered, "My usual. Trying to do what little I can to make amends for everything I've done wrong and trying to hide from SHIELD."

"Well, that I can help you with. As soon as we're done, I'll make sure you get wherever you want to go, no trouble. And I might be able to rig up a little tracker, something to get SHIELD off your scent."

As wonderful as that sounded, Bruce refused to be bought. And besides, he didn't think Tony could take him where he wanted to go, which was January 2006.

But he kept that observation to himself and looked out the window instead; they were definitely in Europe.

The car stopped and Tony swiped Bruce's bag off the seat, adjusting his sunglasses and throwing the door open, bounding up the steps of a building.

"Well, come on, Banner, what are you waiting for? An engraved invitation?"

Since Tony had his bag, Bruce had no choice but to follow. Tony went inside and into an elevator, bouncing on his tiptoes.

The elevator took them to a lab, and Bruce promptly headed over to sit in a chair, feeling like he was going to need the support for whatever bombshell Tony was about to drop on him.

Tony's face lit up, and he dragged over another piece of furniture (_Is that a therapist's couch?_), throwing himself onto it in front of Bruce and setting Bruce's bag at his feet.

Bruce snatched it over to rest at his side and took off his glasses and settled in for what was sure to be a fascinating look into the mind of Tony Stark.

Tony began, "It all started in 1999..." and Bruce promptly fell asleep. It wasn't surprising, given that he never felt safe enough to sleep on planes and had been traveling since the day before.

Stark seemed annoyed when Bruce woke up, but Bruce thought that he might have considered that before flying halfway around the world to blather on at Bruce.

The man was a damn billionaire, he couldn't buy himself another listener?


End file.
